Wednesday, 12 May 2010

BEARSPACE is pleased to present the works of Isabel and Caspar Rock in a collaborative exhibition, for which the two sibling artists have created a series of large scale drawing works, collaborative pieces, animation and sculpture, drawing the viewer in their phychadelic world of pencils, pens and paper.

The works featured in Eye Pain are incredibly detailed and vivid. These dense, richly textured images are the result of years of development by both Isabel and Caspar Rock, and this is reflected in the level of aesthetic depth that the pieces offer, the audience encountering new elements within the works on each viewing. The pair site their influences broadly; these include comics, Japanese animations, Gothic architecture, medieval gangsta rap, mythology and Dantes Infernoe. Eye Pain itself refers to the physical experience that each of the pieces offer the viewer, the works themselves so beautiful and complex, that they become difficult to look at.

The focus upon low-tech materials is a significant element in the work. Basic, yet essential items such as pens, pencils and paper, and simple print processes are used. This emphasis only heightens the extreme attention to detail present in each work. Encompassing its viewer, the exhibition encourages a journey into the depths of the imagination. This experience is centred around the individual, who is surrounded and saturated by imagery, most surfaces covered, making it difficult to escape.

Isabel and Caspar Rock feel that reality is boring. The works in Eye Pain offer a parallel world that is anything but tedious. This world is new, unknown, exciting, uncomfortable and challenging. In the artists quest to bring their audience into their world, they are hosting a number of interactive events, such as a 'zine workshop and lecture, and a drawing battle.